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The American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) is about to vote on a policy against the feeding of raw meat to pets. Specifically the AVMA Council on Public Health and Regulatory Veterinary Medicine will vote to create a policy to "discourage the feeding to cats and dogs of any animal source protein that has not first been subjected to a process to eliminate pathogens because of the risk of illness to cats and dogs as well as humans."

Many vegetarian dog owners have questions about whether or not a vegetarian diet for dogs could be feasible or even healthy. After all, much has been made of the fact that dogs are omnivores – meaning they eat both plants and meat. If this is true, shouldn’t they do just as well on plant-based diets as meat-based ones? The answer to this question can be found by looking at the circumstances of canine evolution and examining the anatomy of a dog’s digestive system.

News spread Friday that fourteen people spread across nine states had become ill from salmonella poisoning after handling tainted dog food. As an advocate of raw pet food, It was interesting to see that the food in question was a cooked kibble.

Pet obesity has been getting a lot of notice in recent years, as our four-legged buddies’ waistlines expand right along with those of many humans. And just as in humans, diet and exercise are the two key factors in how your pet gains - or doesn’t gain - weight.

A lot of considerations drive owners to transition their pets to raw dog food: concerns about health and meeting a dog’s real dietary needs are just some of them. Once you’ve made up your mind to give your dog a raw diet, you have a lot of options when it comes to the kind of protein you’ll be feeding.

No question about it, protein is the basic building block for life. But like most good things, there’s a case to be made for moderation.
Although it’s widely believed that feeding more than the recommended amount of protein has no adverse effects, too much protein can accumulate as fat and lead to potential weight problems for your dog.

One of the biggest challenges we have faced when converting even the most health-conscious pet owner from feeding a kibble or canned diet into a shelf-stable raw dog food diet, like Sojos, is the 15 minutes of soaking time required. Everything is moving along smoothly as new customer reads the bag and smiles at the REAL food they can see through the clear window. Then they read the part in our instructions that says “soak for 15 minutes”.

There’s no doubt about it – interest in feeding raw dog food is strong and growing. As more and more people encounter raw-fed dogs and see how healthy they are, owners look for realistic solutions to do the same for their pets.
However, there’s a persistent perception that feeding raw is too expensive to make financial sense, whatever the benefits might be for a dog or cat. But is it true?
The simple answer: No. And why not? Here are two key reasons:

Earlier this month the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) passed a resolution discouraging the feeding of raw meat to cats and dogs. During the groundswell of opposition that arose in the weeks prior to the vote, there was much fear and gnashing of teeth among raw feeders (including myself) trying to prevent this resolution from passing. Many worried that the AVMA was trying to ban raw food for pets, or that this ruling would ultimately alter the FDA’s stance on raw diets.

Back in the ’50s and ’60s, the pop culture vision of the distant future – like the all-too-crazy-to-imagine year 2000 – often included people getting all their nutrition in the form of a single capsule. While we live every day in that previously unimaginable future, it seems sillier than ever to think that we could get everything our body needs from a pill instead of real food. And why? Because we’ve wised up, and now we know better than to buy into the idea that synthetic food can be as healthy as real food.